d there we'll talk
And warm our wits
With Eastern fallacies
Out of old Fitz!
British old Fitz!

See him, half statesman--
Philosopher too--
Half ancient mariner
In baggy blue--
Such baggy blue!

{135}

Whimsical, wistful,
Haughty, forsooth:
Indolent always, yet
Ardent in truth,
But indolent, indolent!

There at the table
With us sits he,
Charming us subtly
To reverie,
Magic reverie.

"How sweet is summer's breath,
How sure and swift is death;
Nought wise on earth, save
What the wine whispereth,
Dreamily whispereth.

"At Naishapur beneath the sun,
Or here in misty Babylon,
Drink! for the rose leaves while you linger
Are falling, ever falling, one by one."

Ah! poet's soul, once more with us conspire
To grasp this sorry scheme of things entire,
Once more with us to-night, old Fitz, once more
Remould it nearer to the heart's desire!

{136}

_Yattendon_

Among the woods and tillage
That fringe the topmost downs,
All lonely lies the village,
Far off from seas and towns.
Yet when her own folk slumbered
I heard within her street
Murmur of men unnumbered
And march of myriad feet.

For all she lies so lonely,
Far off from towns and seas,
The village holds not only
The roofs beneath her trees:
While Life is sweet and tragic
And Death is veiled and dumb,
Hither, by singer's magic,
The pilgrim world must come.

{137}

_Devon_

Deep-wooded combes, clear-mounded hills of morn,
Red sunset tides against a red sea-wall,
High lonely barrows where the curlews call,
Far moors that echo to the ringing horn,--
Devon! thou spirit of all these beauties born,
All these are thine, but thou art more than all:
Speech can but tell thy name, praise can but fall
Beneath the cold white sea-mist of thy scorn.

Yet, yet, O noble land, forbid us not
Even now to join our faint memorial chime
To the fierce chant wherewith their hearts were hot
Who took the tide in thy Imperial prime;
Whose glory's thine till Glory sleeps forgot
With her ancestral phantoms, Pride and Time.

{138}

_Among the Tombs_

She is a lady fair and wise,
Her heart her counsel keeps,
And well she knows of time that flies
And tide that onward sweeps;
But still she sits with restless eyes
Where Memory slee